First up, my standard load for this barrel, except I tweaked it a bit, partial sizing the cases instead of full length sizing. I was hoping that partial sizing might reduce the standard deviation -- though that did not happen. The 17.7 grain load was slower in the partial sized case so I upped the powder charge to 17.9 grains, just enough to restore the normal 2000+ fps velocity.

I had intended to test all loads with 3 five shot groups and then calculate the mean radius for all 15 shots. However, as you can see on this target with the HVR Loverin bullet, the center of the group shifted slightly as I moved from one bullseye to the another. Maybe the way I held the rifle changed slightly? In any event, the shift was enough to throw off the mean radius if I combined all 15 shots, so instead I calculated the mean radius for each 5 shot group and then averaged the three. That's not the right way to do, it but it was the best I could do to salvage this test.

So how does that compare to the tumblelube version, when using the same HRV lube? Well, the tumblelube bullet with HVR shot about the same. Since the three 5 shot group thing didn't work out, I tried a single 15 shot group:

Next we tried several different tumblelube lubes. Also I was curious how tumble lube would work on a non-tumblelube bullet.

Here's 45/45/10 lube on a Loverin bullet. It received a double dip of the lube, then the bullet was run through the sizing die again to knock off the excess lube. As you can surmise from the picture of the bullets, it so happened that my batch of 45/45/10 was thicker than what most people use -- that's wasn't intentional, it just worked out that way. Dunno if it matters?

-- 2004 fps, 0.9% standard deviation -- nearly identical to the Loverin with HVR.
-- 0.82" mean radius, 0.42" standard deviation -- slightly larger than the Lovernin with HVR.
-- there may have been a little fouling just ahead of the throat.

Next up, Lee Liquid Alox (diluted with solvent to make it dry faster) and the tumblelube bullet. Once again, the barrel was cleaned and then three Liquid Alox fouling shots were fired to season the barrel before serious shooting began:

Accuracy, going by mean radius at 100 yards:
-- the Loverin bullet was more accurate than the tumblelube bullet.
-- HVR was more accurate than any of the tumblelubes.
-- Rooster Jacket and 45/45/10 were about equal in accuracy
-- Liquid Alox was least accurate.

Velocity at 15 feet,, average of 15 shots:
-- HVR was faster than any of the tumblelubes.
-- not much difference between the tumblelubes.

Standard Deviation as a % of average velocity:
-- the Loverin had lower standard deviation than the tumblelube bullet, regardless of lube.

Conclusions:
-- you don't need a tumblelube bullet to tumblelube. In fact, Loverins may actually be the best bullet for tumblelubing.
-- it's OK to apply conventional lube to a tumblelube bullet.
-- Tumblelubes and tumblelube bullets are inferior to HVR and Loverins.
-- but if you are just starting to get into casting and don't want to spend the money on a lubrisizer, it may be possible to get decent performance by tumblelubing.
-- there wasn't a great deal of performance difference between the 3 tumblelubes.
-- I don't know if tumblelube thickness matters? It would be interesting to repeat the test with a single coating of tumble lube vs. 3 coats of tumblelube.
-- if for some reason I were forced to tumblelube, I'd go with Rooster Jacket because it dries faster and is less sticky than the other tumblelubes, and performance is similar.
-- despite my criticism of the tumblelubes, they performed better than I expected for a plain base bullet at 2000 fps.